Freak Show by James St. James
Billy Bloom has been exiled to Florida, a punishment usually reserved for the elderly. However, in Billy’s case he’s a senior in high school and now, through really no fault of his own . . . Really! He’s being forced to live with his absent and wealthy father whose idea of good parenting is to send him to an elite academy located an hour away in a SWAMP!
Before I go any further I should warn you, dear readers, that Billy Bloom is gay. No, not just gay but an aspiring drag queen. He’s not shy about this at all. From the first dazzling entrance he makes at his new school this becomes and issue with a capital I. Suddenly Billy is friendles, ostracized and persecuted. Everyday is some new litany of tortures. His whole disasterous relationship with his peers ends in the football team jumping him and beating him senseless. And that’s only the beginning of the story.
Billy Bloom, coma victim, makes a resolution not to be defeated by the ignorance and prejudice of his classmates. His solution? To run for Prom Queen.
This book is funny. Da . . . er . . . darn funny. To the point that I laughed out loud on the subway ride home when reading it. I don’t do that, normally. The prose is light, frothy and full of a thousand different allusions to pop music, opera, and dead writers’ wives.
James St. James, the author, is also famous for scripting the movie “Party Monster” starring McCauley Culkin and Seth Green in the true story of his relationship with New-York-Ciyt-club-kid, scenster, and murderer Michael Alig (as played by Culkin with Green taking the St. James role). Like that film Freak Show is a bright, rapid comedy about some dark things but still utterly enjoyable. It’s the kind of book that makes you laugh in public and want to read aloud bits to your friends.
–Reviewed by Angela
